1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an acoustic plug for a hard disk drive.
2. Background Information
Hard disk drives contain a number of magnetic recording heads that are located adjacent to a plurality of rotating magnetic disks. The disks are attached to a spin motor that is mounted to a base plate of the disk drive. Each recording head is mounted to a flexure arm. The flexure arms are attached to an actuator arm which has a voice coil motor. The voice coil motor can rotate the actuator arm and move the heads across the surfaces of the disks. The actuator arm is pivotally connected to the base plate of the disk drive. To prevent contamination of the magnetic disks, the drives typically have a cover which encloses the actuator arm assembly, spin motor and disks. The spin motor and actuator arm assembly are typically secured to the base plate by fasteners that extend through the cover.
The rotation of the disks and the movement of the actuator arm create audible frequencies which are transmitted through the cover and emitted from the hard disk drive. The sound of a disk drive can be an annoyance to an end user. Some disk drives incorporate acoustic damping features to attenuate the noise created by the spin motor and the actuator arm assembly. For example, some disk drives include an acoustic plate that is attached to the top surface of the cover. The acoustic plate is bonded to the cover by a damping adhesive that absorbs acoustic energy.
The acoustic plates have openings which provide access to the fasteners so that the disk drive can be disassembled. The openings are adjacent to the spin motor and the actuator arm assembly. It has been found that a significant amount of noise is still transmitted through the openings from the spin motor and the actuator arm assembly. It would be desirable to reduce the acoustic emissions of prior art hard disk drives.